Anat Cohen

Worldwide

Anat Cohen – celebrated the world over for her expressive virtuosity and infectious charisma – has never been more prolific and inspired, onstage and on record. Since 2005, Anat’s series of releases via her Anzic Records label have seen the clarinetist/saxophonist range from hard-swinging to lilting balladry, from small groups to larger ensembles and back again, exploring a universe of music along the way. Anat’s latest release and third this year – Happy Song, to be released by Anzic on October 6, 2017 – sees her drawing on diverse musical loves, from Brazilian music to African grooves, from vintage swing to touching ballads. She also explores Klezmer for the first time on record, perhaps surprising for a musician raised in Tel Aviv and long resident in Brooklyn. The new vehicle for these explorations is the Anat Cohen Tentet, a group of ace New York musicians that made its debut at the Jazz Standard in Manhattan and the famed Newport Jazz Festival. Above all, Happy Song is another synergistic collaboration between Anat and co-producer/co-arranger Oded Lev-Ari, who is also her partner in Anzic as well as a kindred spirit since their high-school days in Israel. Anat has been declared Clarinetist of the Year by the Jazz Journalists Association every year since 2007, and she has also been named the top clarinetist in both the readers and critics polls in DownBeat, the jazz bible, for multiple years running. The release of Happy Song – which features Anat on clarinet exclusively – comes in the 100th anniversary year of the very first jazz clarinet recording, by the Original Dixieland “Jass” Band. When describing Anat Cohen’s presence and impact, Fresh Air’s Terry Gross credits Cohen with “bringing the clarinet to the world” and The New York Times hails her a “Master.”

From WBGO
Take Five: New Music From the Vijay Iyer Sextet, the Anat Cohen Tentet, Matt Wilson and More
By: Nate Chinen
Anat Cohen Tentet, “Happy Song”
We last heard from multireedist Anat Cohen just a few month back, when she released two albums in a Brazilian vein. She’s now announcing Happy Song, an album by her radiant tentet. In...

From Premio da Musica Brasileira
Those Nominated For The 28th Brazilian Music Awards Were Released
Anat Cohen and Marcello Goncalves have been nominated for best Intrumental Album for their album, Outra Coisa.
To read more click here

From DownBeat Magazine, July 2017
Anat Cohen – Perfect Accent
By: Allen Morrison
The “great room” of clarinetist Anat Cohen’s ultra-modern Brooklyn loft apartment has many luxurious attributes—high ceilings, open kitchen, a gleaming black Steinway grand piano and a treasured view of the East River—but the most striking feature is an oil painting that adorns one wall.
The painting, by...

From KNKX Public Radio
Anat Cohen And Trio Brasileiro: For The Love Of Choro
By: Robin Lloyd
For her third appearance in the KNKX studios, Anat Cohen brought along Trio Brasileiro, the group that presents the very popular spring choro workshops at Centrum in Port Townsend.
Brazilian choro music is a cousin of jazz, mixing European melodic and harmonic traditions...

From The Chicago Tribune
Clarinetist Anat Cohen revels in the sounds of Brazil
By: Howard Reich
The most joyous moments of last year’s Chicago Jazz Festival came from the clarinet of Anat Cohen, whose soaring melodic lines and seemingly effortless virtuosity inspired robust ovations at the Pritzker Pavilion in Millennium Park.
When Cohen returns to Chicago on Monday evening, she’ll...

From Metroactive
Copacabana Clarinet: Anat Cohen at Cafe Stritch
By: Nick Veronin
GIRL FROM IPANEMA: Anat Cohen is actually from Tel Aviv. But lately, she’s been enchanted by the choro music of Rio.
Acclaimed jazz clarinetist Anat Cohen has always connected with Brazilian music, though it took moving across an ocean for her to realize it. “I heard it growing...

From NY Observer
The Best In Jazz
By: Ron Hart
Anat Cohen and Trio Brasileiro, The Jazz Standard, May 16-17
Not since the heyday of Jimmy Guiffre has there been a clarinet player whose redefined the instrument’s role in jazz like Israel’s Anat Cohen.
Cohen just released a pair of works that delve deep into her love for Brazilian music....

From All About Jazz
Anat Cohen’s Brazilian Bonanza: Outra Coisa And Rosa Dos Ventos
By: Dan Bilawsky
It’s not exactly a secret that Anat Cohen is smitten with the music of Brazil. Her clarinet is a key voice on the Choro Ensemble’s albums, she’s peppered her own dates with the work of Milton Nascimento, Chico Buarque, Luiz Bonfa, and Hermeto...

From Fox 17 West Michigan
Famed jazz musician Anat Cohen performing with local high school jazz bands
By: Lindsay Hoffman
World famous clarinetist and saxophonist, Anat Cohen, will be performing live in Grand Rapids Wednesday night.
Thanks to the Michigan State University Federal Credit Union donating $1 million to the MSU Jazz Department, the school can bring world class jazz...

From The Detroit News
Clarinetist Anat Cohen kicks off a week in Michigan
By: Susan Whitall
Anat Cohen knows that her instrument, the clarinet, doesn’t always get the respect it deserves.
Earlier generations of musicians picked up the clarinet because they loved the sly, swinging way Benny Goodman played it, or because of the syncopated New Orleans style of players...

From KPLU
By KPLU
Getting Together: Anat Cohen and Fred Hersch
When Anat Cohen returned to the KPLU studios this spring, the bright young star of the clarinet was joined by a piano great who’s been looking back on a fantastic career. Live in our studios, the two friends were intently focused on the moment at hand.
The pair talked...

from nbcsandiego.com
Duet to It: Fred Hersch and Anat Cohen’s breathtaking exchange
There is something about the duet concept that creates a possibility for magic to happen. It can be more demanding and rewarding for both audience and performer, but when it works — like when pianist Fred Hersch and clarinetist Anat Cohen graced the stage at the Athenaeum Music...

from jazzpolice.com
Fred Hersch and Anat Cohen at Jazz Standard, 5/13/16
For the past ten years, virtuosic composer/pianist Fred Hersch has held a Duos Residency at Jazz Standard in May – for each of seven nights, he meshes musical chops with a different duo partner. In the midst of duos week, he paired up with a recent collaborator, clarinetist Anat...

From downbeat.com
Anat Cohen Tentet Brings Retro Sound and Ebullient Spirit to Jazz Standard
By: Ken Micallef
Listening to clarinetist Anat Cohen and her new tentet perform original material at the Jazz Standard on April 19 was like being a guest at a secret soiree, where the sense of fun is contagious and swing is seriously the thing.
To read...

From theepochtimes.com
Immigrants: A Blessing to Our American Music
By Barry Bassis
“I could easily write a book about Israeli jazz musicians or at least a chapter on The Three Cohens, two brothers and a sister from Tel Aviv, who have achieved stardom together and separately.
Anat Cohen has been leading Downbeat polls as the top clarinet player for years,...

From The Huffington Post
Anat Cohen Swings in the New Year on Toast of the Nation
By Penny Schwartz
Boston – In a New Year’s Eve encore of a not-to-be-missed performance, master reed player Anat Cohen kicks off 2016 on National Public Radio’s Toast of the Nation, a musical celebration featuring jazz giants from across the country.
In addition to...

From mlive.com
Anat Cohen explains why jazz clarinet doesn’t get respect that it should
By Jeffrey Kaczmarczyk
“‘What a lot of people associate it with is squeaking,’ she said with a laugh. ‘We still have to overcome the notion that clarinet squeaks.
‘People need to remember what a beautiful instrument it is, including in popular music,’ she added.
Back in...

from kplu.org
Clarinetist (and sometime saxophonist) Anat Cohen is a one-woman music-blender. Born and raised in Tel Aviv and now living in New York, Anat lays out a world of influences in almost every song she plays. Jazz, classical, klezmer, tango, Brazilian — whatever style or genre of music you can think of, you’ll hear at least echoes of it...

From KPLU
Anat Cohen – Flat-Out Brilliant
By: KPLU
Clarinetist (and sometime saxophonist) Anat Cohen is a one-woman music-blender. Born and raised in Tel Aviv and now living in New York, Anat lays out a world of influences in almost every song she plays. Jazz, classical, klezmer, tango, Brazilian — whatever style or genre of music you can think of,...

From rivergrandrapids.com
Acclaimed Jazz Musician Anat Cohen at St. Cecelia December 10
By Andy Rent
“Featured on more than 21 albums, Cohen released her seventh record as a bandleader earlier this year on her label Anzic Records entitled Luminosa. Luminosa features Cohen playing singing/dancing originals, Brazilian classics by the likes of Milton Nascimento, and even re-imagining electronica as acoustica with...

From jazzpolice.com
SFJAZZ Presents “Sacred Space: Celebrating the Clarinet” at Grace Cathedral
By Ken Wermes
“On November 12, SFJAZZ presented a performance as a part of its long-standing series at Grace Cathedral, on top of Nob Hill in San Francisco. This series of performances, in co-operation with the cathedral staff, offers musicians a unique opportunity to present music of an...

From chicagotribune.com
Music Institute celebrates women in jazz
By Myrna Petlicki
““This year we decided to celebrate women in jazz with three red hot concerts — Anat Cohen, Tammy McCann and Dee Dee Bridgewater,” said President and CEO Mark George. “As long as jazz has existed, there was tremendous amounts of discrimination against female jazz players. But in the present...

From columbiaspectator.com
Israeli Afro-Latin jazz clarinetist Anat Cohen on recent album and more ahead of Celebrando Brasil’ Miller Theatre concert
By Nicholas Cho
“Few musicians capture the global essence of jazz like Anat Cohen.
After moving from Tel Aviv, Israel to Boston, Mass. to study at Berklee College of Music, clarinetist Anat Cohen developed an ear and a fluency in...

From kplu.org
Earshot Jazz Festival Preview: Anat Cohen’s Joyful Clarinet
By Robin Lloyd
“Clarinetist Anat Cohen’s transcendent appearances with the Seattle Repertory Jazz Orchestra last February are still resonating. ‘I loved the trip to Seattle, loved meeting all the people there, the SRJO and other musicians. It was great time, and a wonderful hang,’ she said. ‘Everybody there is so...

Cohen says, “There’s nothing better than when everything clicks and you’re inside the magic of music. You know you’re doing something for your own soul and you can touch some other souls. You’re creating something that is positive. And adding positive energy into the world, this is the rewarding part of being a musician.”
To read the full article click...

Anat Cohen’s music is out of this world. And that’s exactly where she wants to be. When she’s playing clarinet or saxophone with her quartet, everything else melts away.
“Actually, it’s my preferred state, if I may be honest, to be lost inside the music on stage,” the Tel Aviv-born, New York-based artist says. “You go into like a different...

“Anat Cohen didn’t know it at the time, but as an aspiring jazz musician growing up in Tel Aviv in the late 1980s, she absorbed a global assortment of sounds. Between immigrants from South America and Israeli musicians who spent time abroad and then returned home to share the styles they studied, she picked up an array of Latin American...

From NPR Music
Songs We Love: Anat Cohen, ‘Putty Boy Strut’
By: Patrick Jarenwattananon
It begins with meandering clarinet and clipped, four-on-the-floor percussion. A little bit later comes a countermelody, and the image that comes to mind is something from early New Orleans, or perhaps a Mediterranean folk song. It’s even called “Putty Boy Strut” — that could be an...

From The Tribune-Review
Cohen’s latest shows ongoing artistic growth
By: Bob Karlovits
‘LUMINOSA’
Anat Cohen (Anzic)
“Luminosa” takes on as many musical sounds as it varies its musicians. Playing in basically a quartet, Anat Cohen offers work on clarinet, bass clarinet and tenor saxophone. But that group is joined by one of two guitarists on five of the 11 tracks,...

From ASCAP
ASCAP Audio Portrait: Anat Cohen’s Luminosa
Clarinetist and saxophonist Anat Cohen brings her musical worlds together on her seventh album, Luminosa. The Israeli virtuoso instrumentalist and bandleader draws on her love of jazz, Brazilian classics and Choro, and electronica to create an album that is filled with warm, rich original compositions and inventive covers. Cohen has topped Downbeat’s...

from jazzdagama.com
Anat Cohen: Luminosa
By Raul de Gama
When, if ever, have you heard the clarinet played as magically as this; the pure music of the instrument given as naturally as breathing, yet recreated from an entirely novel perspective? When have you seen fingerwork as scintillating and heard the breathing as inspired—short, perfunctory and declarative, and rhetorical gasps alternating...

From NPR
Review: Anat Cohen, ‘Luminosa’
By Melissa Block
Jazz musicians don’t get much more global than Anat Cohen, an Israeli who’s known for playing Brazilian improvisation in the United States. She plays an instrument that’s no longer common in jazz, the clarinet. Michelle Mercer has this review of Cohen’s new album, “Luminosa.”
MICHELLE MERCER, BYLINE: The last time the...

From TwinCities.com
Review: Anat Cohen brings clarinet into modern era with flair
By Dan Emerson
Anyone who might consider the clarinet an outdated instrument with no place in modern jazz should hear Anat Cohen, who performed at the Dakota jazz club Sunday night.
Cohen, who was born and raised in Israel but now lives in New York, has been credited...

From Downbeat
Anat Cohen, Luminosa
By Frank Alkyer
Clarinetist Anat Cohen has always been a world musician, bringing sounds from around the globe into her style of jazz. On Luminosa, she expands on these eclectic musical passions to deliver a beautiful, 11-tune album. Cohen sets the scene with her touring band—Jason Lindner on keyboards, Joe Martin on bass and Daniel...

From The Chicago Tribune
From Brazilian to avant-garde, brilliant new jazz albums
By: Howard Reich
The next wave of important jazz recordings shows musicians experimenting with new forms and revivifying old ones.
Among the highlights:
Anat Cohen: “Luminosa” (Anzic Records). During the past few years, Cohen has emerged as a singular voice on clarinet, the disarming lyricism of her playing...

Delaware County News Network
Anat Cohen Quartet brings luminosity to Longwood Gardens
By: Marianne Gunther
When guests began to arrive at Longwood Gardens in the early evening this past Saturday, the site was getting ready for closing to the general public, but not for people holding tickets for the Gardens’ Jazz Series, where theAnat Cohen Quartet was set to perform...

From The New Yorker
Anat Cohen
The clarinet may never reassume its place in the forefront of jazz, but it won’t be for any lack of trying on Cohen’s part. This Israeli-born stylist is also a fine saxophonist, but her skillful clarinet excursions run through a wide variety of styles, including post-bop, New Orleans jazz, Brazilian music, klezmer, and Middle...

observer.com
Passion Play: Anat Cohen Combines an Exuberant Persona With a Soulful Sound
By: Matthew Kassel
When she’s onstage, Anat Cohen likes to dance and snap her fingers while bantering with the audience and shouting approvingly at her bandmates. You get the sense she’s trying not to take things too seriously—until, that is, she brings her instrument to her lips...

From The Seattle Times
Anat Cohen brings reed genius to Seattle big band
By: Paul de Barros
Local jazz fans have been enthusiastically declaring Israeli reed whiz Anat Cohen’s concerts this past weekend with the Seattle Repertory Jazz Orchestra (SRJO) the best shows in the 20-year-old big band’s history.
Hmm.
Past SRJO performances with Clark Terry, who died Saturday, and...

From zealnyc.com
Luminous Anat Cohen Debuts Her New Album at Jazz Standard
Born in Tel Aviv, Israel and based in New York, Anat Cohen stands prominently as one of today’s jazz’s top go-to performers who has appeared as a frequent bandstand collaborator with Newport Jazz Festival impresario George Wein as well as playing/recording in an ensemble with her brothers (older...

From PRX
New Jazz Archives on Anat Cohen
By: Jeff Haas
This week, it’s stories and sounds from jazz’s history overseas. We’ll talk with Israeli saxophonist Anat Cohen about why Israel is becoming a hotbed for new jazz talent, and take a look at the nearly hundred-year-old history of jazz in Japan. And we’ll hear the story of how the...

From City Newspaper
By: Ron Netsky
Jazz Fest, Final Night: Ron reviews Newport Jazz Festival All Stars, Stephanie Trick, and Scott Feiner & Pandeiro Jazz
Imagine Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman and Spider-Man all working together. That’s what it was like when the Newport Jazz Festival All Stars took the stage to celebrate the great festival’s 60th anniversary at Kilbourn Hall...

From Ottawa Citizen
By: Peter Hum
Jazzfest review: Newport Jazz Festival: Now 60
The all-star septet billed as Newport Jazz Festival: Now 60 provided a feel-good jazz experience for a TD Ottawa Jazz Festival crowd on Friday night.
Like the SFJAZZ Collective out of San Francisco, and the Monterey Quartet of a few years ago, the Newport group is a...

from jpost.com
Three cool cats make up the Cohen jazz trifecta
By: Barry Davis
Members of bands that stay in business for a long time – and they are generally few and far between – often talk about having a sense of kinship. That includes the squabbles as well as the closeness and the shared creative nous.
Jazz trumpeter Avishai...

from southbendtribune.com
Group has the cred to fly Newport banner
By: Jack Walton
For most of us here in the Midwest, the Newport Jazz Festival is a phenomenon that exists in our record collections rather than in our vacation plans.
The posh seaside setting in Rhode Island has provided a backdrop for some incredible performances over the past six decades,...

from kansascity.com
An all-star bill brings Newport jazz to Kansas City
By: Joe Klopus
Rhode Island’s Newport Jazz Festival has made lots of history in its 60 tumultuous years. It’s the site of musical milestones and great performances, as heard on live albums by Miles Davis, Duke Ellington, Thelonious Monk, Dave Brubeck, John Coltrane and Billie Holiday. There have been...

from triblive.com
Newport festival tribute delightfully lacks surprises
By: Bob Karlovits
With a lineup that includes trumpeter Randy Brecker and singer Karrin Allyson, it was no surprise the Newport: Now 60 show at the Manchester Craftsmen’s Guild was more than simply a tribute.
It also was a concert filled with a similar — and delightful — lack of surprises.
It...

from bostonglobe.com
All-star ensemble signals a forward-thinking Newport Jazz Festival
By: Jon Garelick
How do you keep a 60-year-old summer music festival up, running, and vital?
Well, one way is to run a promotional anniversary tour in February. At least, that’s what the Newport Jazz Festival is doing.
The festival’s producers have mounted a 21-date tour with a band of...

from artery.wbur.org
Newport Jazz Festival Founder Brings The Sounds Of Summer To Boston
By: Claire Dickson
Sixty years ago George Wein changed the way live music is experienced. He founded the Newport Jazz Festival, the first American jazz festival. At 87, Wein continues to produce the festival and this year he’s set up an all-star group as a preview of...

from chicagotribune.com
Anat Cohen to headline NIU’s Feb. 1 Clarinet Cornucopia
By: P. Palian
Advance purchase tickets are now available for an on-campus performance by world-renowned jazz clarinetist Anat Cohen, scheduled for 1:15 p.m. Saturday, Feb. 1
Known for her expressive virtuosity and delightful stage presence, Cohen and her band perform on the Concert Hall stage in the NIU Music...

from chicagomaroon.com
“Brazilian rhythm and a laid-back New York groove” at Logan
By: Robert Sorrell
The Anat Cohen Quartet exploded on stage at the Logan Center last Sunday, continuing the Jazz at the Logan series with selections from Cohen’s most recent recording, Claroscuro. Cohen, a clarinet virtuoso who was voted Clarinetist of the Year six times in a row by...

from winnipegfreepress.com
Tightrope (Anzic Records)
By: Chris Smith
THE 3 Cohens are many things: improvisers, composers, great musicians and figurative tightrope walkers.
Siblings Anat (tenor saxophone, clarinets), Avishai (trumpet) and Yuval (soprano sax) play mostly a cappella on Tightrope, their fourth recording.
The three have uncanny musical rapport, and their emphasis on horns-only music and improvisation here cements the chemistry...

from ajwnews.com
3 Cohens are back again with their horns
By: Mordecai Specktor
The 3 Cohens – Anat, Yuval and Avishai – play their horns (saxophones, clarinet and trumpet) unaccompanied on most of the 18 tracks that comprise their new album, Tightrope (Anzic). The siblings from Tel Aviv, who play together and with various other ensembles, have developed a sort...

from jstandard.com
Anat Cohen plays Rockland
By: Abigail Klein Leichman
“I always try to surround myself with music and be part of as many projects as I can,” says award-winning Israeli jazz clarinetist and saxophonist Anat Cohen. She and her eponymous quartet will headline the annual Chazen Jazz Concert at Rockland Community College’s Cultural Arts Center on October 26 at...

from chicagotribune.com
Clarinetist Anat Cohen and guitarist Douglas Lora perform during the Hyde Park Jazz Festival at the Rockefeller Chapel on the University of Chicago campus Saturday
By: Howard Reich
Anat Cohen and Douglas Lora Duo at the University of Chicago’s Rockefeller Memorial Chapel. Every great jazz festival needs a world premiere, and the Hyde Park gathering has an unforgettable...

from allaboutjazz.com
Anat Cohen & Choro Aventuroso Feat. Leni Andrade at 54 Below
By: Ernest Barteldes
The quartet. led by Anat Cohen, kicked off its early set with a selection of classic Brazilian choros that were enhanced by the individual talents of the Israeli reeds player’s pan-Brazilian quartet, which featured accordion, acoustic seven-string guitar and pandeiro. The group’s chemistry was...

from online.wsj.com
The Beat That Puts Even Bossa Nova to Shame
By: Will Friedwald
Compared with choro, which exploded in Brazil in the early 20th century, the bossa nova seems monotonous and anticlimactic. This quartet features three Brazilians: accordionist Vitor Gonçalves, Cesar Garabini on the Brazilian guitar, which features an ultralow seventh string to allow it to fill the roles...

from nydailynews.com
Weekend Jazz best bets: Anat Cohen’s Choro clarinet at 54 Below and the Charlie Parker Jazz Festival at Marcus Garvey Park
By: Wayne Lockwood
It’s hard to believe, watching Anat Cohen move so gracefully on clarinet with a hot group of Brazilian players, that about 15 years ago she hadn’t encountered Choro, the music she loves so much....

kplu.org
Anat Cohen Quartet Concert on Jazz Northwest
By: Jim Wilke
Anat Cohen has been winning both critics and readers national jazz polls for several years and she tours continually, playing major jazz festivals and clubs around the world. The last week of July found her in Port Townsend, WA where she was teaching and performing at Centrum’s annual jazz...

from blogs.seattletimes.com
Cool first night at Jazz Port Townsend
By: Paul de Barros
The opening concert featuring multi-reed player Anat Cohen on B flat clarinet, with Hamilton and Seattle’s Dawn Clement (piano) and Chuck Deardorf” (bass). Cohen’s version of Fats Waller’s “Jitterbug Waltz” showed she has moved beyond mere mastery — she was all over that licorice stick! — to...

From the Rochester City Newspaper
JAZZ FEST 2013, Day 5: Ron reviews Anat Cohen, John Patitucci Trio, Julian Arguelles, and Alfredo Rodriguez
By: Ron Netsky
Xerox Auditorium is not exactly the ideal venue for a jazz concert. It is, after all, a sterile corporate auditorium. But Tuesday night Anat Cohen breathed new life into it by breathing a dizzying array...

from wxxinews.org
VIDEO: Anat Cohen at the Jazz Festival
By: Juan Vazquez
Anat Cohen headlined the Xerox Auditorium during Day 5 of the Xerox Rochester International Jazz Festival. WXXI cameras were there to record this number during one of her two performances on Tuesday.
To watch the video click here

from democratandchronicle.com
Review: Working hard for the moments on Day 5
By: Jeff Spevak
Some musicians come with a built-in moment. Tony Bennett and “I Left My Heart in San Francisco.” Mr. Rogers and “Won’t You Be My Neighbor?” But most musicians have to work for it, night in and night out. And Anat Cohen really worked it Tuesday night,...

from chicagotribune.com
Three top clarinetists salute the master, Benny Goodman
By: Howard Reich
Each of the clarinetists approached this repertoire quite differently, and each illuminated a distinct facet of Goodman’s music. But Cohen surely came closest to evoking the sensuousness of Goodman’s sound, the propulsion of his rhythm and the soaring high spirits of his up-tempo playing.
From Cohen’s first...

from rochestercitynewspaper.com
Interview: Anat Cohen
By: Ron Netsky
When Israeli clarinetist Anat Cohen steps out of her Brooklyn home, she finds herself between two worlds. Cohen resides in Williamsburg, a vital neighborhood in the New York jazz scene. But Williamsburg is also a center of Hasidic Judaism in the United States.
“I live right on the border,” says Cohen. “I...

washingtonpost.com
Mary Lou Williams Women in Jazz Festival begins final year as women-only showcase
The headline blared: “Why Women Musicians Are Inferior.” It was cringe-inducing even in 1938, when the respected jazz publication DownBeat printed the essay. A rebuttal from a female saxophonist — a “skirt swinger” — was further ridiculed when DownBeat slapped on the title “How Can You...

from nytimes.com
Jazz’s Skinny Stepchild
By: Joe Nocera
In search of some live Brazilian music a few months ago, I found my way to Dizzy’s Club Coca-Cola, in the Time Warner Center, where the Brazilian percussionist Duduka Da Fonseca was leading a quintet. I can’t say I knew much about Mr. Da Fonseca before I heard his band that night,...

Every year, the North Sea Jazz Festival hands out the Paul Acket Award to an artist deserving wider recognition for their extraordinary musicianship. The winner of the Paul Acket Award 2013 is the Israeli musician Anat Cohen.
Anat Cohen is an Israeli clarinettist, saxophonist and band leader who mixes jazz with different styles of ethnic music. She plays with her...

stljazznotes.blogspot.com
StLJN interview: Anat Cohen
The Greater St. Louis Jazz Festival began as primarily an educational event for local student jazz bands, and although the festival has been booking headlining talent for several years now, the professionals performing at the GSLJF still are involved in putting on workshops and adjudications for the students.
As you’d expect, the questions they get...

stljewishlight.com
Israeli clarinetist Anat Cohen is must-see Jazz Festival artist
By: Marvin Glassman
Israeli clarinetist Anat Cohen is on top of the music world. She has been voted as clarinetist of the year for six consecutive years (2007-12) by both the jazz music writers association and Downbeat Magazine, a popular magazine for jazz fans. Cohen has been compared to Benny...

from http://adrianyekkes.blogspot.co.uk
Anat Cohen Quartet at Pizza Express
By: Adrian Yekkes
Anat Cohen played her first ever UK gig last night at Pizza Express Jazz in London. The final concert of her quartet’s European tour played to a full house that was left wanting more after two brilliant sets of
compositions mostly taken from her current album – Claroscuro, which...

from standard.co.uk
Anat Cohen quartet, Pizza Express Jazz Club – music review
By: Jack Massarik
Back in the Swing era, when clarinet was king, its leading exponents, bandleaders Benny Goodman and Artie Shaw, were superstars. The Bop revolution changed all that, but if anyone can bring the once-mighty “liquorice stick” back into fashion after a half-century in the shadows it’s...

from winnipegfreepress.com
Cohen the pied piper of jazz
By: Chris Smith
If there were a pied piper of jazz, it would be a woman playing a clarinet as jazz fans happily followed her wherever she led them.
And that woman would be Anat Cohen, who led happy jazz fans through many styles of music Sunday afternoon during the second of...

from edmontonjournal.com
Concert preview: Clarinet hard to ignore in Anat Cohen’s hands
Israeli-born musician brings quartet to Yardbird Suite
By: Roger Levesque
EDMONTON – For decades now, the once popular clarinet has sat on the sidelines of jazz music, practised by a few skilled, veteran players who tended to stick with traditional material.
Anat Cohen may be changing that.
Still...

from writteninmusic.com
ANAT COHEN – CLAROSCURO
By: Henning Bolte
Anat Cohen (1975), the middle of the Cohen family of musicians from Tel Aviv, has a vibrant musicality, is all music (for the Cohen family see HERE and HERE to Written In Music ). Her game – on clarinets and saxophones – is pure musical pleasure, her own pleasure and equal...

From The Canadian Jewish News
Top Israeli Clarinetist to Perform in Canada
By: Marvin Glassman
Israeli clarinetist Anat Cohen is on top of the music world. She has been voted as clarinetist of the year six years in a row (2007 to 2012) by both the Jazz Journalists Association and Downbeat Magazine. She has been compared to Benny Goodman and...

from winnipegfreepress.com
Anat Cohen is making the clarinet cool
By: Chris Smith
Jazz musician Anat Cohen is adept at tenor and soprano saxophones, as well as the clarinet.As a good jazz musician, clarinettist and saxophonist Anat Cohen will introduce surprises into her performances — a tune you didn’t expect, an unusual phrase, a solo you’ll talk about for a long...

marlbank.tumblr.com
Anat Cohen to make her UK debut
By: Stephen Graham
She’s been on the cover of both Downbeat and Jazz Times, and with the release of her latest album Claroscuro as recently as the autumn, the multi-award winning clarinet, bass clarinet and saxophone player Anat Cohen, with a finely honed individualism in her extraordinarily burnished playing, here achieves maximum...

from southflorida.com
3 Cohens, many influences
By: Bob Weinberg
George Wein’s Newport All-Stars seemed a bit out of place among the percussive, groove-heavy lineup of San Juan’s 2010 Heineken Jazz Fest. How would a bluesy, traditional jazz group fare amidst a roster of Latin-jazz superstars? And yet, when the band’s clarinetist, the Israeli-born Anat Cohen, started blowing hot ‘n’ sweet...

from sfgate.com
Review: A look at overlooked albums of 2012
By: The Associated Press (Excerpt by Charles J. Gans)
Israeli-born Anat Cohen is doing her utmost to ensure that the clarinet no longer remains an overlooked instrument in modern jazz. On “Claroscuro” — a Spanish term referring to the play between light and dark in painting — Cohen offers a...

from kansascity.com
Jazz artist Anat Cohen creates a dance to remember
By: Bill Brownlee
The inspiration for “Anat’s Dance,” the title of a selection performed by the Anat Cohen Quartet at the Folly Theater on Friday, wasn’t difficult to discern. Cohen spent much of the evening rapturously swaying, displaying uninhibited salsa moves and pumping a fist in the air.
Her...

from kansascity.com
Jazz Town: One player offers the world’s jazz
By: Joe Klopus
Award-winning multireedist Anat Cohen is on a musical journey around all the world’s styles. For example, her new album has songs from France, Brazil, South Africa and the heart of the jazz tradition.
This expansive journey, which brings her and her quartet to the Folly Theater on...

from philly.com
Karl Stark’s Best in Jazz
By: Karl Stark
Anat Cohen, Claroscuro (Anzic Records). As jazz goes more international, it is only proper that a Tel Aviv-born clarinetist based in New York should play music from Brazil, France, Cuba, and South Africa, with some New Orleans sass thrown in. Only Anat Cohen, a master storyteller on reeds, can pull...

from blogs.opb.org
Top 10 Albums of 2012
By: Matt Fleeger
The 3 Cohen siblings (Yuval, Anat, Avishai) showcase their abilities for songwriting, playing and passionate improvisation on this swinging, hard-driving release. Guest vocalist Jon Hendricks joins the band for a couple of tunes – making this album a diverse, and solid, listen the whole way through. There’s something special about...

from NPR
Anat Cohen on Piano Jazz
Israel-born clarinetist and saxophonist Anat Cohen joins Marian McPartland, along with bassist Gary Mazzaroppi and drummer Glenn Davis, for a quartet edition of Piano Jazz.
Born and Raised in Tel Aviv, Anat Cohen grew up in a musical family: Her older brother Yuval played saxophone and her younger brother Avishai played trumpet. (Both...

from The Chicago Tribune
Only one clarinetist on earth could have come up with the album “Claroscuro,” its stylistic breadth expressing the singular esthetic of soloist Anat Cohen.
That Cohen careens on this disc from original compositions to Brazilian fare, from historic repertoire to bracing new music sums up her approach to the art of jazz improvisation and composition. That...

rochestercitynewspaper.com
CD Review: Anat Cohen “Claroscuro”
By: Ron Netsky
Since her move from Israel to New York in 1999, Anat Cohen has dazzled audiences on a variety of reed instruments including clarinet, bass clarinet, soprano sax, and tenor sax. She is also one of those rare players who is somehow capable of spanning the entirety of jazz history on one...

allaboutjazz.com
Anat Cohen at Kennedy Center Jazz Club
By: Fran A. Matzner
Anat Cohen has received no shortage of accolades of late and her rise is a testament to her stunning capacities on clarinet and saxophone. She is no stranger to Washington, DC audiences either, packing clubs and concert halls from Bohemian Caverns to the Sixth and I Synagogue. Most...

from ajwnews.com
A more intimate clarinet festival
By: Mordecai Specktor
Jazz clarinetist Anat Cohen reports that she was spared the calamitous effects of Hurricane Sandy.
“We’re some of the luckiest people — we were not affected,” she says, during a phone conversation with the AJW last week from her home in New York City. “Everything is fine in my neighborhood;...

chicagoreader.com
Jazz: The Whammies and Anat Cohen
By:Peter Margasak
Though the Umbrella festival dominates this weekend’s jazz and improvised-music calendar, it’s hardly the only action in town. On Sunday Israeli clarinetist Anat Cohen returns to the area for a show at SPACE in Evanston with her excellent quartet—pianist Jason Lindner, bassist Joe Martin, and drummer Daniel Freedman. In September Cohen...

from jazzhistoryonline.com
Anat and Avishai Cohen at the Wolf Theatre, Denver (October 27, 2012)
By: Thomas Cunniffe
It is a rare treat for us in the hinterlands to hear live authentic jazz from Brooklyn. There are several progressive sub-genres developing inthat New York borough, and the Cohen family—clarinetist Anat, trumpeter Avishai and saxophonist Yuval—are at the forefront of those ideas....

blogs.phoenixnewtimes.com/
Anat Cohen: From Israel With Swing
By: Mark Keresman
Quickly: How many female jazz instrumentalists can you name? Not singers, of which there are aplenty, but ace players of instruments of the female gender? There are more prominent ones on the scene than there were, say, 30 years ago—composer/bandleaders Carla Bley and Maria Schneider, trumpeter Ingrid Jensen, guitarist Mary...

from allaboutjazz.com
Anat Cohen: Claroscuro (2012)
By: Dan Bilawsky
Art begets art on Anat Cohen’s Claroscuro. The Israeli-born, New York-based multi-reedist leaves the confines of Benny Goodman’s world behind, following her clarinet-only sojourn into king of swing territory, Clarinetwork: Live At The Village Vanguard (Anzic, 2010), with a wide-ranging musical treatise on the balance between light and dark. Cohen addresses...

from http://articles.philly.com
Jazz
Anat Cohen
Claroscuro
(Anzic Records ***1/2)
As jazz goes increasingly international, it is only right that a Tel Aviv-born clarinetist who lives in New York should play music from Brazil, France, Cuba, and South Africa, with some New Orleans sass thrown in.
Anat Cohen is a master storyteller on reeds, and her working band – pianist Jason...

from culturalpurveyor.com
Anat Cohen Again Breathes New Life into the Jazz Clarinet
By: Bob Cochran
There haven’t been many great clarinetists in Jazz since the days of Sidney Bechet, Artie Shaw and Benny Goodman. That changed a few years ago when Anat Cohen came on the scene. She first became known for her saxophone work when she and her brothers,...

from npr.org
Born in Tel Aviv, Anat Cohen came to New York two decades ago to study the masters of jazz. In so doing, the clarinetist and saxophonist started a bit of a stampede: Today, Israel is exporting some of the most vital jazz out there.
After years of also studying the music of South America, Cohen has chosen to...

from triblive.com/
Claroscuro
By: Bob Karlovits
Offering a variety of tones and shades on clarinet, Anat Cohen does indeed create something that could be called “Claroscuro.” Rapidly turning into one of the best clarinetists in jazz, Cohen offers originals, a gently drifting version of “La Vie en Rose,” Artie Shaw’s “Nightmare” and a great version of “Um a Zero” from...

jazzpolice.com
“Claroscuro”: The Many Shades (and Vibrant Colors) of Anat Cohen
By: Andrea Canter
Even a few weeks before her new recording was released, Anat Cohen had earned the #1 ranking for clarinet in Downbeat’s Critics poll and graced the cover of Jazz Times’ “Women’s Issue” (September 2012). The spotlight was already well earned; Claroscuro (Anzic), however, serves as confirmation...

from jazzinspace.blogspot.com
The clarinetist and multi-reedist Anat Cohen has a sound that speaks in an array of brilliant colors. As a performer and leader, (she recently kicked off the release of “Claroscuro” on Anzic Records with a six night gig at the Village Vanguard, a comfortable space that she called “one big living room”) Cohen knows how to pull a...

latinjazznet.com
Anat Cohen – Claroscuro
By: Raul de Gama
This is so characteristic of the glorious reeds and winds style of Anat Cohen and it is no exception on Claroscuro as well. Cohen is one of the most adventuresome clarinet players since Don Byron seemed to pick up from where Eric Dolphy left off on bass clarinet at least. Her...

from jazztimes.com
*Anat Cohen at the Village Vanguard 9/22/2012
The multi-reedist pays homage to Goodman and the rest at the legendary club*
By: Scott Krane
It has been more than 70 years since Benny Goodman, a nice clarinet-blowing Jewish boy from Chicago, emerged on the jazz scene and kept things swinging in the homeland during the Second World War. Today,...

Anat Cohen – celebrated the world over for her expressive virtuosity on clarinet and saxophone, not to mention the sheer joie de vivre in her charismatic stage presence – presents the latest record of her evolution with Claroscuro, her sixth album as a bandleader. To be released by Anzic Records in September 2012, Claroscuro takes its title from the Spanish...

from seattletimes.com
Israeli clarinetist Anat Cohen sparkles on ‘Claroscuro
By: Paul de Barros
The clarinet went so hopelessly out of fashion in jazz after the swing era it was anybody’s guess when it would make a comeback. Don Byron gained the first major yardage, but the soulful, ebullient Israeli musician Anat Cohen has scored a touchdown. Perhaps because of her...

from winnipegfreepress.com
Four good choices and a sackbut joke, too
By; Chris Smith
Multi-reedist Anat Cohen showcases her versatility as an instrumentalist and in her choice of musical styles on her sixth album as a leader.
The Israeli-born, New York-based Cohen combines buoyant dances and dark ballads; thus the title, which describes the play of light and shade in art....

from wsj.com
Anat Project It All
By: Tad Hendrickson
The New York jazz community, long populated by players from around the world, has seen a major influx of excellent Israeli musicians in last 20 years.
Among this crowd, the stand-out is doubtless Anat Cohen, who as a clarinetist and multi-reedist has topped several jazz polls in recent years. Now living...

from wicn.org
Catch Colors of Jazz when host Bonnie welcomes Clarinetis​t-Saxophon​ist Anat Cohen to celebrate the September 25th release of her new album Claroscur​o. Named Jazz Journalist Association’s 2012 Multi-Reeds Player and Clarinetist of the Year, the Anzic Recording Artist has the distinction of being honored with multiple JJA JAZZ AWARDS for six years running. On Claroscur​o, Ms. Cohen is...

allaboutjazz.com
Anat Cohen: Claroscuro (2012)
By: Ernest Barteldes
Reed multi-instrumentalist Anat Cohen seems equally comfortable performing Brazilian jazz with Duduka Da Fonseca’s quintet, contemporary jazz with her two brothers in the Three Cohens, or Afro-Cuban and more straight-ahead material with the countless ensembles with which she has worked over the years. Claroscuro reflects Cohen’s unique ability to tackle multiple genres...

from allaboutjazz.com
Excerpts From:
Newport Jazz Festival 2012
The final Harbor Stage act on Saturday proved to be one of the most memorable of the weekend, with three of the most important clarinetists in jazz joining together as one. George Wein made a rare appearance at the microphone, explaining that he’d been trying to get Anat Cohen, Ken Peplowski and...

from audaud.com
Anat Cohen – Claroscuro – Anzic Records ANZ-0040, 67:04 ****½
By: Jeff Krow
If you look up eclectic saxophone and clarinet players on Wikipedia, I wouldn’t be surprised if the name and photo of Israeli musician, Anat Cohen didn’t show up. Anat has been everywhere in the last 5-10 years. After settling in New York City, she has...

from straightnochaserjazz.libsyn.com
Podcast 288: A Conversation with Anat Cohen
When Downbeat magazine’s Critics Poll appeared earlier this month, to no one’s surprise, Anat Cohen captured the award as Best Clarinet player, and earned the Rising Star award on Tenor Saxophone. She was a dual winner at the Jazz Journalists’ Awards for Clarinetist of the Year and Multi-reeds Player of the...

The Jazz Journalists Association announced winners of the 2012 Jazz Awards at the Blue Note in New York City Wednesday. Anat Cohen was awarded Clarinetist of the Year and Multi-reeds Player of the Year
Downbeat Magazine also released the results of it’s 60th Annual Critics Poll. Anat took home the award for Clarinet in and was named the top Rising...

Anat Cohen recently talked with PRX‘s Jeff Haas on The New Jazz Archive to talk about about why Israel is becoming a hotbed for new jazz talent.
You can stream the program here
(Anat’s segment starts around 50:30)

From The Reading Eagle
Anat Cohen Headlines Berks Jazz Fest’s New Faces of Jazz Concert
By: Susan L. Peéa
“New Faces of Jazz,” a concert by the Anat Cohen Quartet and Eldar, will be presented at Reading Area Community College’s Miller Center for the Arts on Saturday at 7:30 p.m. as part of the Boscov’s Berks Jazz Fest.
Cohen, a...

from bwog.com
Anat Cohen Quartet at Miller
Anat Cohen absorbs the klezmer of her heritage and cranks out a mix of Afro-beat, Brazilian choro, avant garde jazz, and just about everything in between. She masters whatever woodwind instrument she can get her hands on and it’s clear that the world has started noticing. Her recent rise to the ranks of...

from timesunion.com
Jazz musician Anat Cohen to play The Egg
By: R.J. DeLuke
To watch Anat Cohen play her horn on stage, whether it’s saxophone or clarinet, is to observe an artist fully engaged the experience. Full of passion. Full of joy. When she’s not soloing, she’s moving to the music being made by her comrades. She might sway, dance,...

From The Hartford Courant
Jazz’s Anat Cohen Headlines Diabetes Fundraiser
By: Owen McNally
Along with her soulful mix of fire and finesse, Anat Cohen, the brilliant, Israeli-born clarinetist/saxophonist, is a jazz existentialist who plays completely in the moment with moving poetic expression, urgent directness, clarity and concision.
Besides her celebration of spontaneity, the acclaimed instrumentalist/composer’s stylistic hallmarks include a passion...

From Broadway World
Anat Cohen Quartet To Make Miller Theatre Jazz Series Debut 2/11
From Miller Theatre Director Melissa Smey:
“I am so thrilled to present the Anat Cohen Quartet as part of our Jazz series this season. Anat Cohen has been on my wish list for a while now, and I cannot wait to share her incredible gifts as...

From Mezzo
Watch a bonus video from the Paris Jazzed Out series below featuring the Anat Cohen Quartet performing “Casa Del Llano” with Anat Cohen on clarinet, Jason Lindner on keyboard, Joe Martin on bass, and Daniel Freedman on drums:

From Centre Daily Times
CONCERT REVIEW: Anat Cohen Shares Spotlight With Her Jazz Quartet
By: Jenna Spinelle
Anat Cohen might have had top billing Thursday night, but she certainly wasn’t afraid to step back and let her band mates shine.
Cohen, a clarinetist and saxophonist, performed in Schwab Auditorium Thursday with her quartet — drummer Daniel Freedman, pianist Jason Lindner...

From Centre Daily Times
Life Experience Colors Anat Cohen’s Jazz
By: Jenna Spinelle
Anat Cohen’s second visit to Penn State promises to take the audience on a global journey and, along the way, show that jazz comes in many shapes and sizes.
Cohen, a clarinetist and saxophonist performing with her quartet at Penn State Oct. 27, grew up in Tel...

From Israel Ministry of Foreign Affairs
Anat Cohen – Israeli queen of clarinet
By: Avigayil Kadesh
Tel Aviv native Anat Cohen is hard-put to explain why she has just received, for the fifth consecutive year, the Jazz Journalists Association’s Clarinetist of the Year award.
“There are not a lot of jazz clarinetists out there,” she says modestly, after some thought....

From Jazz Virtuosa
A Celebration of Women in Jazz
Anat Cohen – Clarinet Conversation
Anat Cohen knows how to make a clarinet sing. In fact, as I write this, I am listening to her arrangement of “A Change is Gonna Come,” one of my favorite songs by the legendary Sam Cooke. Her rendition of “A Change is Gonna Come” is...

From The Jerusalem Post
Blue and white and ‘Noir’ in Givatayim
By Barry Davis
Titans of the local and ethnic music scene are featured in the upcoming Festijazz festival.
The Festijazz festival closes out its first decade of existence at Givatayim Theater next week with a highly varied program. As an Israeli jazz-based event, most of the usual suspects from...

from Los Angeles Times
Bill Cosby, jazz connoisseur
June 8, 2011
Now in its 33rd year, this weekend’s Playboy Jazz Festival needs no introduction as a summertime fixture on the L.A. music scene. Yet arguably that tradition wouldn’t be the same without emcee Bill Cosby, who this year is hosting for the 30th time.
Cosby’s occasional interjection of one-liners from...

From OffBeat
Jazz Fest Focus: Anat Cohen
By: Zachary Young
“My first exposure to jazz was through the music of New Orleans,” says saxophonist and clarinetist Anat Cohen. Growing up in Tel Aviv, Israel, one of her earliest musical experiences was as a member of the Jaffa Conservatory’s Dixieland band. Recordings of Sidney Bechet stoked that interest. “There was so...

From Tablet
Jazz Standards: Israeli clarinetist Anat Cohen, a master of expressive improvisation, leads a talented wave of expatriate musicians flooding the New York jazz scene
By: Ben Waltzer
Late one night this summer you could walk down East 27th Street in New York, enter a doorway under a neon sign that beamed “Jazz Standard,” descend a staircase, and hear...

From The San Antonio Express-News
Anat Cohen Quartet: Top-flight jazz at the Carver
While the annual “Chanukah on the River” was rocking the River Walk, Tel Aviv-born/New York City-based reed wizard Anat Cohen and her band, Benny Green (piano), Peter Wahington (bass) and Lewis Nash (drums), were helping jazz fans celebrate chanukah on Sunday evening with a salute to Benny...

From ABC
Winter’s Eve 2010
NEW YORK (WABC) — The holiday tree was officially lit up at the Winter’s Eve celebration at Lincoln Square.
The 11th Annual Winter’s Eve at Lincoln Square was held in Dante Park on November 29th and featured a tree-lighting ceremony with WABC-TV anchor Sade Baderinwa.
The festival also included outdoor food tastings from over two...

From the Mid Atlantic Arts Foundation
Mid Atlantic Arts Foundation Announces 2011-2012 American Masterpieces and Mid Atlantic Tours Rosters
Mid Atlantic Arts Foundation has announced the rosters for its 2011-2012 American Masterpieces and Mid Atlantic Tours programs. Fee support is available to presenters in Delaware, District of Columbia, Maryland, New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, Virginia, U.S. Virgin Islands and West...

from NPR.org/ablogsupreme
‘Jazzed Out’ All Over Paris
by Patrick Jarenwattananon
Jazzed Out is a series of 10 short, videotaped performances of jazz musicians playing sessions in unconventional venues. It looks to be edited much like the Take-Away Shows, and taped all across the city of Paris. Anat Cohen’s quartet, Avishai Cohen (the bassist, not Anat’s brother), Jacques Schwarz-Bart’s quintet, and...

From The San Francisco Chronicle
Israeli Musicians Bring Global Sound to SFJazz
By Jesse Hamlin
It’s hard to keep track of all the brilliant young Israeli jazz musicians on the scene these days. Three of New York’s finest – trumpeter Avishai Cohen, his woodwind-playing sister Anat Cohen and bassist Omer Avital – will dig into a rich range of music...

From All About Jazz
Anat Cohen: Clarinetwork Live at the Village Vanguard
By Raul d’Gama Rose
Anat Cohen can make the clarinet sing—literally and figuratively. On Clarinetwork Live at the Village Vanguard her wonderful, flowing melodic lines swoop and soar like arias placating the most high. It is as if—in that spiritualised state of grace—Cohen, in her singular, burnished or...

from The Boston Globe
Newport Jazz Festival: A study in contrasts
by Steve Greenlee
NEWPORT, R.I. – The eclectic mix of styles that is the hallmark of the Newport Jazz Festival couldn’t have been displayed any better than it was mid-afternoon yesterday. As trumpeter Wynton Marsalis took his quintet through an hour of buttoned-down, straight-ahead jazz on the main stage,...

from The Hartford Courant
Israeli Clarinetist Anat Cohen’ Featured Sunday at Litchfield Jazz Festival
By Owen McNally
Anat Cohen, one of the best among Israel’s many jazz exports to the United States, demonstrates her world-class clarinet chops Sunday night as she performs with her quartet at the 15th annual Litchfield Jazz Festival in Kent.
A highlight of the star-studded weekend...

Join NPR, WBGO, and WGBH for two days of live webcasting, broadcasting, and archival recordings from the Newport Jazz Festival on August 7th and 8th. Features include artist interviews, photo streams, and live chats.
Be sure to catch performances by IMN artists Anat Cohen, Jason Moran, and Dave Douglas here.

(From All About Jazz)
By: Thomas Conrad
Published: June 11, 2010
Anat Cohen is one of the major jazz success stories of the last decade. She arrived in New York from Israel in 1996 and, by the turn of the century, was an important factor in the reemergence of the clarinet as a solo jazz instrument. Yet her recordings have...

(From Jazz Police)
By: Andrea Canter
Published: April 28, 2010
In a recent Jazz Times “Before and After” column, Anat Cohen, after listening to a track by bassist Nillson Matta, described the music as “ an elastic pole moving from side to side.” It would be an apt metaphor for her own clarinet. Over the past decade, the Berklee-trained, New...

(From The Chicago Tribune)
By: Howard Reich
Published: April 23, 2010
When Anat Cohen was growing up in Israel, in the 1970s and ’80s, opportunities to hear world-class jazz musicians in person were scarce. Though Tel Aviv teemed with local artists playing the music, American virtuosos who defined the art form only sporadically crossed her radar, she says.
Nonetheless, in...

(From The Minneapolis Star Tribune)
By: Rick Mason
Published: April 17, 2010
With a ferocious, rafters-rattling sound, scurrying, cutting-edge improvisations, dizzying eclecticism and, by all accounts, a charismatic presence that overflows the bandstand, Anat Cohen appears on the brink of taking the jazz world by storm. And since the clarinet has emerged as her primary instrument, the Israeli native could...

(from The Morning Call)
By STEVE SIEGEL
Published: March 11, 2010
The Anat Cohen Quartet got up on the Williams Center stage Wednesday night, eased into a syncopated 9/8 Latin beat, really gunned it for awhile with some straight ahead jazz, wailed like an Islamic call to prayer, and ended with a soothing samba.
And that was just the first...

From San Diego Union-Tribune (by: George Varga)
The wide world of jazz is broader and more global than ever, 77 years after Duke Ellington first toured Europe and more than 90 years after Alabama-born James Reese Europe and his big band became the first American jazz group to perform on the European continent . . .
. . . Moreover,...

Anat Cohen: Clarinetwork Live At the Village Vanguard
Releases: April 13, 2010
From Shore Fire Press Release:
On April 13, Anat Cohen will release her first live album, Clarinetwork: Live At The Village Vanguard on her own Anzic Records. The album was recorded on one evening – July 5, 2009 – during an historic 6-night residency at the legendary venue...

Supplied by NPR
January 1, 2010 from WGBH – In 1996, saxophonist Anat Cohen left Tel Aviv, Israel to study at the Berklee College of Music. Since then, she picked up the clarinet, moved to New York, started playing frequently in Brazilian music ensembles and eventually released four acclaimed albums that launched her star high in the jazz world. But...

From Berklee Today (by: Mark Small)
Berklee grad, Anat Cohen returned to her alma mater to perform on New Year’s Eve:
“Cohen played tenor saxophone for two years in the Israeli Air Force Band before entering Berklee in 1996. Berklee Professor Phil Wilson detected something distinctive in her clarinet playing and encouraged her to develop it. The instrument has since...

This year, the Belgrade Jazz Festival featured two of IMN’s artists including Anat Cohen and Joe Lovano. For more news and highlights from Joe Lovano’s Fall 2009 tour, visit www.imnworld.com/joelovano
That there is such a thing as a Belgrade Jazz Festival will come as a surprise to many American jazz fans. The last time most Americans thought about Belgrade was...

ASCAP President & Chairman Paul Williams has announced that ASCAP will add seven music greats to the ASCAP Jazz Wall of Fame on Tuesday, June 16, 2009 and the first-ever ASCAP Jazz Wall of Fame Prize will be presented to clarinetist/saxophonist/composer Anat Cohen for her promise in Jazz composition and musicianship.
Click here to read the full article at All...

In her Waverly Place apartment, Israeli-born clarinetist Anat Cohen is transcribing Benny Goodman solos, preparing to celebrate his centennial next month at the Village Vanguard.
“I wish I could just be there at that time, and I could just get up and dance, and jitterbug with everybody else,” Cohen says. “His swing is just so exciting. And he really goes...

Reading, PA – Anat Cohen, a clarinetist and tenor saxophonist who has gained a big reputation in the past decade as one of the most talented artists of her generation, led a formidable quartet Sunday afternoon in Reading Area Community College’s Miller Center for the Arts. Click here to read the full article at The Reading Eagle.

WBGO, October 22, 2008 – It’s not quite enough to say that Anat Cohen has many interests in jazz. To start, she plays three instruments: clarinet and both soprano and tenor saxes. Then she plays them in various and sundry settings, including modern jazz, traditional ensembles, classical music and every type of Afro-Latin hybrid imaginable: Argentinian, Brazilian, pan-Caribbean and so...

On Wednesday June 18th at the Jazz Standard in NYC, Anat Cohen was the recipient of the award for "Clarinetist of the Year" by the Jazz Journalists Association. IMN congratulates Anat on this well deserved achievment.
The Jazz Journalists Association announced winners of the 2008 Jazz Awards, the non-profit professional organization’s 12th annual celebration of excellence in jazz and jazz...

Rising jazz star Anat Cohen will be featured this weekend on NPR’s Weekend Edition Sunday (June 24) . She will talk to host Liane Hansen about her new albums Poetics and Noir (both on her own Anzic Records label), her childhood in Israel, and some of the influences that helped her develop her uniquely international sound. Check local broadcast times...

Israeli clarinetist and composer Anat Cohen is into traditional jazz, Brazilian choro, Argentinean tango and Middle Eastern music.
She recently visited the WNYC studios to explain how she mixed them all in two different new albums, Noir and Poetica- being simultaneously released on Anzic Records on May 8th.
Hear the entire interview with musical excerpts here

Anat Cohen Symphony

Clarinetist and saxophonist Anat Cohen has taken the jazz world by storm, winning hearts and minds the world over with her expressive virtuosity and delightful stage presence. As JazzTimes says, “With the clarinet she becomes a singer, a dancer, a poet, a mad scientist, laughing — musically — with the sheer delight of reaching that new place, that new feeling, with each chorus.” An established bandleader and prolific composer, Cohen’s music is a unique blend of modern and traditional jazz, classical music, Brazilian choro, Argentine tango, and an expansive timeline of Afro-Cuban styles. Her symphonic repertoire ranges from buoyant dances to darkly lyrical ballads, showcasing her fluency in a global set of styles. The perennial winner of “Clarinetist of the Year” titles from DownBeat, JazzTimes, and the Jazz Journalists Association, Fresh Air‘s Terry Gross credits Cohen with “bringing the clarinet to the world” and The New York Times hails her a “Master.”

Anat Cohen Quartet

Clarinetist and saxophonist Anat Cohen has taken the jazz world by storm, winning hearts and minds the world over with her expressive virtuosity and delightful stage presence. As JazzTimes says, “With the clarinet she becomes a singer, a dancer, a poet, a mad scientist, laughing — musically — with the sheer delight of reaching that new place, that new feeling, with each chorus.” An established bandleader and prolific composer, the Anat Cohen Quartet program is a unique blend of modern and traditional jazz, classical music, Brazilian choro, Argentine tango, and an expansive timeline of Afro-Cuban styles. The perennial winner of “Clarinetist of the Year” titles from DownBeat, JazzTimes, and the Jazz Journalists Association, Fresh Air‘s Terry Gross credits Cohen with “bringing the clarinet to the world” and The New York Times hails her a “Master.”

Anat Cohen & Trio Brasileiro

Clarinet virtuoso Anat Cohen has always felt a deep connection to the musical traditions of Brazil – an influence readily apparent in a number of her original recordings and live performances. Over numerous trips to Brazil, Anat has found kindred spirits in the remarkable musicians of Trio Brasileiro, whose devotion to the language of music and love of Brazilian music she shares. Consisting of the celebrated guitarist, Douglas Lora; one of Brazil’s finest mandolinists, Dudu Maia; and the amazing percussionist, Alexandre Lora; Trio Brasileiro joined Anat Cohen on a collaborative album released in 2016, Alegria Da Casa which, as the title suggests, is a work of pure joy. Anat & Trio Brasileiro look forward to the release of a second recording and tour dates around the world in Spring 2017, performing music that celebrates the rich and varied culture of Brazil, blended with Anat’s ebullient brand of jazz.

What’s not to love about a young clarinetist and saxophonist who plays everything we love—modern jazz, world music, “hot” New Orleans style jazz—and does it all brilliantly?The Wall Street Journal

Versatile, expressive mainstream-jazz reedist Anat Cohen has emerged as one of the leading clarinetists of her generation, adept at everything from Dixieland to Brazilian music.Time Out New York

The New York jazz community, long populated by players from around the world, has seen a major influx of excellent Israeli musicians in last 20 years. Among this crowd, the stand-out is doubtless Anat Cohen . . .The Wall Street Journal

A present day multicultural wonder… An enthralling clarinetist and a persuasive saxophonist, [Anat Cohen] displays a pan-historical, pan-cultural approach to jazz.The New Yorker

With the clarinet she becomes a singer, a dancer, a poet, a mad scientist, laughing—musically—with the sheer delight of reaching that new place, that new feeling, with each chorus.JazzTimes

Ms. Cohen on the clarinet was a revelation. Using the clarinet’s upper register, she could evoke infectious joy. In the lower register, her playing could conjure a deep, soulful melancholy. On up-tempo numbers, her improvisations weren’t just bebop fast; they had a clarity and deep intelligence that is really quite rare. She made it look effortless, even as she was playing the most technically difficult of all the reed instruments… she took my breath away” The New York Times

This is the kind of music — warm, human, diverse and irresistible — that will not only bring the clarinet back into favor, but jazz itself.Seattle Times

The lyric beauty of her tone, the easy fluidity of her technique and the extroverted manner of her delivery make this music accessible to all.
The Chicago Tribune

Along with her soulful mix of fire and finesse, Anat Cohen, the brilliant, Israeli-born clarinetist/saxophonist, is a jazz existentialist who plays completely in the moment with moving poetic expression, urgent directness, clarity and concision.” The Hartford Courant

…jazz clarinet has been outnumbered by even the accordion and harmonica. Anat Cohen is leading the instrument’s charge back to the throneThe Wall Street Journal